138 



COCOA 



CHAP. 



for the purpose on a stalk. Grafting by approach will 

 only meet with success when the stock is still in the 

 seedling stage. 



Grafted trees bear fruit at an earlier age than seed- 

 lings, and at the Experiment Station at Dominica graft- 

 ing of "Alligator" cocoa (Theobroma pentagona) gave 

 thirty to forty pods per tree two and a half years after 

 grafting. This result is certainly encouraging, but it 

 is still questionable whether grafted trees would be as 



/\ \ 



FJG. 48. Sketch of the method of grafting by approach. 



prolific as seedlings in the end, and whether a plantation 

 consisting of such trees would yield as big a crop as a 

 plantation consisting of seedlings. 



The habit of grafted trees differs from that of seed- 

 lings. They do not have an upright stem, branching at 

 3 to 4 feet above the ground, nor the regular branch- 

 system, but begin to branch a few inches above the 

 point of union, and generally make an irregular branch- 

 system. Such dwarf trees have the advantage of 

 making the picking of the fruit easy, and in windy 

 countries, like Dominica, their low growth is a protection 

 from the wind. Still these trees require as careful a 



